Many automotive vehicles, including cars, SUVs, motorbikes, etc., have braking systems equipped with disc brakes. Generally, in such braking system, when the brakes are activated, a metallic disc continuously engages with a set of brake pads, to stop the wheels quickly. The brake pads are generally mounted on a set of brake calipers, which keeps them in continuous contact with the brake disc, and the friction produced during the contact ceases the rotation of the wheels.
‘Brake Disc Scoring’, in this context, refers to a state of brake disc erosion that reduces friction between the brake pads and the brake disc, when they are in contact with each other. Further, it's generally a short term effect of cosmetic nature, however, severe brake disc scoring can lead to reduced brake disc integrity under high thermo-mechanical load. Under rainy conditions, when a vehicle is driven on a wet road surface, the brake discs have a higher tendency to pick up small metallic particles from the road surface. In certain regions, where the winter season is often accompanied by snowfall, the problem of disc scoring is exacerbated, when moist gluey particles of a mixture containing water, snow and de-icing substances used for thawing the snow layer deposited on the roads, such as salt, stick to the brake pads or the brake disc. When a substantial amount of metallic particles stick to, and eventually, get accumulated over the brake disc, the reduced friction within the region of contact of the brake pads and the brake disc, may lead to disc scoring. Eventually, this may reduce the braking power of the disc brakes. Further, this may also lead to weakening of the strength of the brake disc or the brake drum, a problem that cannot be ignored, specifically, under high thermo-mechanical load conditions.
Many conventional attempts have been made to avoid scoring of the brake disc or the brake drum in vehicles. One such solution in the art attempts to alleviate the problem by applying brake linings to the brake disc or the brake drum of the vehicle. The brakes of the vehicle are activated, to produce a minimal deceleration, for removing the particles deposited on the brake disc/drum, based on certain conditions. Such conditions take many factors into account, such as, detection of the driver's activation of the accelerator pedal or the brake pedal, checking a driver independent braking process intervention, a yaw rate control process, a traction rate control process, detecting wet/rainy conditions using sensors coupled to the vehicle or the wiper frequency, etc.
Other conventional attempts to reduce brake disc scoring rely on detecting a brake-activation-free time for vehicles, under wet conditions. Specifically, if the time elapsed since the braking system of the vehicle was last activated, reaches a certain threshold value, an automatic braking operation is carried out, to remove particles deposited on the brake disc.
In another attempt, electromotive actuation devices coupled to both sides of the brake disc, are actuated, to clean the brake disc. Similarly, many other conventional methods incorporate factors, such as, the time of year, the geographic location, climatic zone, atmospheric moisture, external temperature, design of the road network, fuel consumption, engine running time, overall rotational speed of the engine, the distance traveled by the vehicle since last braking operation was performed, to reduce brake disc scoring.
Considering the aforementioned problems, and in light of the conventional solutions, a need still exists for a more accurate and efficient method for substantially reducing scoring of the brake disc/brake drum of a vehicle, especially when the vehicle is driven in rainy conditions.